So It Ends
by Azolean
Summary: What happens when the Ronins can no longer fight?


**A/N:** I am aware of the fact that this was once posted on another site under another name. Don't give me any flak about it. Secondly, this was originally written a long time ago...before the death of my better half. Anything and everything I post here is dedicated to Truth, my soul-sister, best friend, daughter, and much more. My better half was buried with her. I only post this as a response to someone who said it wasn't right for me to "tear up" someone else's writing and not put anything of my own out for others to review. Well, here's some stuff. It sucks. I don't need to be told how. It just does.

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**Part One**

Pain. That was his existence now. Beyond the realms of misery or agony and into the excruciating existences of torture; Screams of soul-wrenching power ripped from the very core of his being; leaving blood to mingle with the saliva upon his lips. Cries that echoed into the unforgiving darkness that consumed not only the vision of his eyes, but also what little remained of his shattered soul.

_"And the blood! My god, there is so much blood..."_ he thought dimly.

No. Not just blood. That was the red of his armor, his heart. Not only had they shattered his soul, but the armor as well. The armor lay in pieces all around him, mingling in the pools of blood throughout the cavernous room he now lay in. So alone in the darkness with his suffering.

His lips twitching into a blood covered, grotesque parody of a mirthless grin, coherent thought returned to torment him once again.

_"If only I _had _been alone in my torture,"_ he thought bitterly.

Through the darkness came yet more screams. No longer able to form words, those insanely suffering screams he had come to recognize. Time meant nothing in this place. He only knew that in the time he had been here he had come to recognize those soul-wrenching screams that tore at his heart far more excruciating than any torture they had yet inflicted upon him.

_"Who was it this time?"_ he wondered vaguely.

It didn't really matter anymore. They were all broken and beaten. This was the end and he knew it. But this dark lord of evil had no such intentions of letting his foes die without having tasted what real suffering was. He had beaten them...all of them. In one unified blast he had captured the five Ronins and four Warlords leaving behind the bloodied and ruined masses of flesh that had once been a smiling Mia and Yulie. Now within his mocking grasp, he had all the time in the world to inflict all manner of suffering upon his nine prisoners. One by one he had shown them the meaning of torture in mind, heart, body, and soul.

_"Sai"_ he thought distantly. _"Those screams belonged to Sai. Poor Sai," _he thought unfeelingly, not for the first time. _"You never really were a fighter. You were a peacemaker. Always the nice one..." _

Just then his thoughts, as well as the screams of his friend, were interrupted by the opening of a door somewhere in this dark, condemning room.

"Sire, we have broken through the sixth gate," the voice of the intruder announced.

Roaring with his glorious laughter, Master Kahn left Sai to stand over what remained of the one who had once been proudly known as Ryo of the Wildfire.

"You hear that, Fearless Leader?" he boomed with sadistic joy. "One gate left and the world you knew will exist no more. It will be mine to rule forever."

_"World? Gate? What?"_ he wondered blearily through the haze of blood and pain.

All he could remember was suffering and agony. Dimly, as if from aeons away, he could remember something he was supposed to have done. Some he was supposed to...protect? Battle against? But the only battles he could remember having fought now were those he fought against unconsciousness and the chains that now held him.

"What's wrong, _Wildfire?_" Kahn asked with scorn. "Lose your spirit?"

Calling forth a ball of energy, as one would use a viewer, he showed images of a world of tranquility and beauty and life and people.

"See? This will be mine in only a few more days. All mine and..."

But he heard none of this. Blood and pain-glazed eyes slowly began to come to life once more. It was the people he had seen. He had been a person once. But it seemed so long ago, another life. Not just a person. He had been a friend, a brother, a _warrior._ Most of all he had been a warrior. And it had been his friends who had fought by his side. Brothers in arms, they had fought and protected and sacrificed to keep all those other people from...

_"Knowing this torture..."_ he thought as if from far away.

As if a great, gaping wound had been torn open once again, he began to remember. Yes, he had been a warrior. _A Ronin Warrior._ He and his friends had lived a great and joyous life. He and his friends. Friends. Friends once bonded in spirit by the powers of their armors. Friends now torn apart in the agony of their torturous existence. Friends now dying or dead all around him. Friends who had stood together in a life not so long ago.

Little by little the numbing scab over the wound began to give way as the memories of life and friendship pulled from one side even as the memories of suffering and torture pulled from the other side. In between the two lay the tearing, screaming would now being torn open once more. From within he drew forth all of the memories, clinging to them in a last and desperate effort to remember-so survive.

_"I am Ryo of the Wildfire!"_ he screamed silently.

"NNNNOOOOOO!!" he screamed aloud as yet more blood frothed upon his lips.

Laughing sadistically, Master Kahn gazed down upon Ryo treasuring every moment of the blazing defiance within his tiger-like blue eyes.

"So, there's life in you yet, Ryo of the Wildfire. And I was beginning to think you would be the first to break."

"Never," Ryo gurgled violently, feeling the blood gurgling deep in his lungs.

Turning away from him, Kahn said to all who were still conscious enough to hear him, "Hear that? Three weeks and none of you have broken. I'm impressed. I do believe you'll all die before I'm even through breaking you. But don't get your hopes up. The fun is only just beginning."

With these words still echoing chillingly in the blackness of the air, he disappeared once again. Too exhausted to even maintain consciousness, Ryo thought frantically. It couldn't end like this. Not like this. Not now. Not...

But it was already too late and darkness was coming on swift wings to take him back to the numbing respite of unconsciousness. But that wasn't what he wanted. He needed the suffering now. He had to have it to stay awake, to keep on fighting.

But his fight was already over. And the darkness had come. Yet, through the darkness he fought still in the only way he could.

_"Ancient, help me. Pleas..."_ he begged silently with lips too numb to form words.

Then nothing...

**Part Two**

What felt like aeons later Ryo found himself freed from his suffering and his bonds. Clad only in his sub-armor, Ryo gazed upon himself in total bewilderment. But as he gazed down, the still form of a bloody, twisted mass of flesh lying chained to the floor caught his eyes. What little remained of the what had once been the red Armor of Wildfire barely covered the burned, beaten, bloodied flesh of his own body. Such torture inflicted upon any living person would have had an equal effect. Feeling the fiery rage rising within him, Ryo began to tremble violently as he clenched his armored fists at his sides. Turning a slow circle he saw eight other forms in the darkness of the room. Some in chains, some too broken and beaten to need chains, other still writhing blindly in agony, and still more utterly still as though dead.

These were all that remained of what had once been the proud and powerful Ronins and Warlords. This was all that remained of those he had once known as friends. His entire body trembling visibly somewhere between tears and violence, he stood taking all of this into himself.

Just then a gentle, but firm touch upon his shoulder brought him once more to calm. He had no need to hear the rings jangling upon the staff to know whose hand had brought him such bitterly welcomed comfort. Unwilling to face his mentor, Ryo continued to gaze upon this gory scene of death and torture.

"Is this all that is left for us, Ancient One? Is this how it ends? For us? For our whole world?" he asked bitterly as silent tears of a shattered soul rolled unchecked down his cheeks.

"Yes, Ryo of the Wildfire. This is all that is left for you and your friends. The fight for you and the others has ended," the Ancient spoke in his ever-serene almost unfeeling voice Ryo had once thought of as kind and gentle.

"What was the point? Why did we even try?" Ryo all but whispered in a voice thick with the oceans of tears he knew he would not live to shed. "Why did we fail?"

"As I have said before, the war we fight is with Destiny. As long as such darkness lives within the human heart and soul, we cannot win."

Not trusting his voice, Ryo only nodded.

"I was wrong to ask you to sacrifice your lives. But never had I thought such a day as this would come. Please forgive me. Your fight is over."

Hearing this, Ryo rounded viciously on the Ancient. Wild terror and violence danced in his eyes at the sudden realization of the monk's intent.

"Don't you dare!" Ryo hissed.

Retracting the staff from where he had had it poised over Ryo's head, the Ancient gazed quizzically.

"I can give you peace and end your suffering, Wildfire," the Ancient said almost tenderly.

"No, Ancient. It will not end like this," Ryo simply stated with defiant determination.

"There is nothing more you can do," the Ancient replied softly. "As long as there remains evil and hate-"

"No," Ryo repeated firmly. "Who are we to say that people will always be as they are now?"

"Kahn is almost in total control of the mortal world. Once he is in power hate and evil is all there will be left in the world. He will destroy all that is good."

Turning once more to his writhing, tortured friends, Ryo shook his head.

"No," he whispered. "It's not over. Even here in this place of hatred and evil there is still good. Within our hearts, beyond all the suffering, we still have friendship and love and courage and so much more. As long as these things still exist, there is hope, Ancient One."

For a moment the Ancient considered silently the foolishly defiant, yet wise words of this one young man. Finally coming to a decision within his own mind, he faced Ryo again.

"I do not understand what it is you plan, but I will give you the time you wish. Remember what I have said, Wildfire, for you are now speaking for more than just yourself and your own endurance of suffering. Call upon me when you are ready."

With that the Ancient faded once more into the nothingness. Alone again, Ryo gazed upon the broken, shattered forms of his beloved friends. Tears rising once more, Ryo wondered if he had made the right decision. Praying only that he could endure for them, he returned to the eternal darkness of his newfound existence and his own shattered flesh.

**Part Three**

_"Can it be?"_ Sage wondered blearily in the darkness. _"The Ancient? Ryo? Am I dead already?" _

But, as he felt the stabbing pain of broken bones within his legs, he knew he still lived. Though he could no more see Ryo and the Ancient than he could the walls of his imprisonment, he had heard it all. Of all the suffering he had endured, the loss of his eyes had been the worst. For without his eyes he could no longer see the light that was his only hope and power. In the darkness all alone it was hard to fully detach one's mind from body.

Yet somehow he had survived. No, his mind had not survived as well as the others. He could only remember now the endless screaming alone in the darkness for some eternal, unremembered time. He had been unable to form coherent thought in some time. And focusing enough to reach the others psychically was far beyond possible. Aside from being unable to focus, he knew touching the others would only bring him their suffering and torment as well.

Now as he struggled back to sanity and conscious thought, he remembered those early days. He had reached to each of them and eased their suffering. Soothing their minds even as he worked to heal their wounds. He had been the one that had held them together. But that was so long ago. And he had more than paid the price for his sacrifice and hope of survival.

They had all paid.

But he hadn't been able to give up. No, he no more gave up than the others had. After Kahn had burned his eyes out, he had wrapped himself in a protective sheet of ice. When even that unfeeling layer had been stripped away, he had resorted to ceaseless, insane mental screams. Screams to blot out-or mingle-with those of his friends. Screams to force away coherent thought. Screams to shatter his mind. All the while protecting his spirit. The only and only thing left Kahn had been-so far-unable to reach.

Yet...

And so he released his mind to rely upon his spirit to restore calm unfeeling to his being. For the only way he could think now was to let go of feeling and body. Forcing its way back to the surface, Sage released his spirit's cold tranquility upon himself.

_"Yes,"_ he thought.

That had been both the Ancient and Ryo he had heard talking. Though he had not heard all of the exchange, he had heard enough to understand. For a moment he wanted to lash out violently at Ryo for stopping the Ancient from releasing them. At the same time he was grudgingly thankful. But these feelings and thoughts were greatly dimmed by one far more vague.

_"Hope..."_ he thought with mixed wonder, awe, and fear.

Ryo had been right. Of all of them, Sage had known best of all that each and every one of them had harbored a secret hope. For himself it had been the protection of his spirit. For Ryo it was an ever-burning defiance. In Sai it was a dream of the everlasting peace within the boundless depths of the oceans. Dais had created mental illusions of a life before the armors. Cale transformed the pain into concealing layers of pure darkness. Kayura had interpreted each new misery as a sufferance for redemption. Kento had fought against the pain as he fought his mighty opponents in the real world. Sekhemet had doused each new agony in waves of numbing venom. And Rowen...

Tears Sage thought he no longer had sprung up at the thought of his closest friend and how he had dealt with the suffering in order to survive and keep hope alive. For Rowen the pain and the one who had inflicted it had become the brutal face of his father. A foe he knew he could battle and emerge the victor in the end. And even those battles he lost he always held the hope that one day he would grow strong enough to fight back.

_"But why?"_ Sage wondered bitterly. _"Why keep hope alive now?" _

Even if the nine of them had somehow managed to survive this in the end, none would ever fight again. Their bodies were shattered beyond healing. None would ever wield a weapon again. And that is all their bodies had become-weapons. Without those there was no hope.

Through the darkness Sage heard and sensed Ryo's slowly returning consciousness. All of them were beyond speaking audibly. Some, Sage wondered, may even be beyond speaking psychically. But the others didn't matter right now. Ryo, however, did. Relaxing himself to into his now useless practices of mind and spirit, he brought himself to focus once more.

_"Ryo? Can you hear me?" _

There was a startled moment of fearful hesitation before Ryo tentatively reached out in return.

_"Sage?"_ he asked in almost total disbelief.

_"Yes,"_ Sage said, forcing himself to refrain from healing his friend's broken, twisted body.

Holding back a near cry of joy, Ryo all but wept in relief as new hope flooded him once more. Of all of them, Sage had endured the most suffering. If only because he had fought so hard to keep each of them alive, to keep each of them sane. The last time he had heard anything from Sage it had been the most horrifying, inhuman screams of sheer insanity and torment he had ever heard.

_"Sage..."_ Ryo thought hesitantly.

_"I'm still here, Ryo. I'm still here,"_ he sent back, answering his leader's unasked question.

_"What...? Why...? How...?"_ A hundred times Ryo tried to form the thoughts, but couldn't quite pull it all together in his mind.

_"I heard you and the Ancient,"_ Sage answered flatly.

_"Me too..."_ came Sai's weak thought.

_"I think we all did,"_ came Rowen's strongest thoughts, though still weak and distant.

Through their psychic links, Ryo and Sage could feel the varying degrees of suffering and consciousness within all of them. Yet Sage found himself utterly amazed once again at both the strength and resilience of all of them. But, even for their link, there was no stopping the now shared sufferings of nine beaten and battered minds, hearts, souls, and bodies. Knowing the pain the nine now shared would serve only to confuse and distract them, Sage summoned all his remaining psychic ability and strength. Carefully he drew in each of their consciousnesses. In so doing, he took in all of their pain as well; leaving them clear minded enough to communicate through him. Straining against all of this, Sage wondered just how long he could hold out this way before he really _did_ snap.

_"We don't have much time,"_ Sage told all of them clearly, hiding the suffering and strain he now endured.

But they all saw and they all knew. Eight waves of sympathy and gratitude swept over him to give him strength.

_"Why, Ryo?"_ Dais asked. _"Why stop him from gathering the armors and releasing us from this hell?" _

_"I-I don't know..."_ Ryo replied in a voice barely a step removed from defeat.

_"To keep hope alive,"_ Kayura answered firmly.

_"It's true, you know,"_ Sai added softly, weakly. _"There is still good in all of us." _

_"Duh, Sai. You think?"_ Kento shot back at his friend, not unkindly.

_"But that does us no good,"_ Rowen hissed in frustration.

_"Why bother?"_ Dais asked once more.

_"Our bodies are useless,"_ Cale put in bitterly.

_"That may be so, but-"_ Sage started.

_"But that's not the point!"_ Ryo bounced back hotly in defiance to silence them all.

_"Our hope may survive to the very moment of our deaths,"_ Kayura hesitantly stated. _"But, beyond us, it is lost forever." _

_"Is it?"_ Sage mused coldly.

_"What do you mean?"_ Sekhmet asked.

_"Our hope may die with us,"_ Ryo jumped in, _"but not the hope of others." _

_"What are you talking about, Ryo?"_ Sage asked, not sure if he was believing what he was now hearing.

_"Our hope is not just our own. We are the hope of our world as well,"_ Ryo stated to all of them, sounding very much like the Ancient himself.

_"You're crazy,"_ Kento told him. _"You have no idea what you're talking about." _

_"If we die, so does everyone else's hope,"_ Cale explained. _"There is nothing beyond that, beyond_ us."

Silently Ryo flailed and fought for words to explain what he now thought and felt as his ideas began to slowly coalesce. But there were none. Maybe Kento was right. Maybe there really _was_ nothing left for anyone anymore. As he touched upon the agony Sage now endured for him to communicate clearly with the others, he felt his defiance slowly beginning to burn itself out. Maybe he had been wrong to further their suffering. Maybe he should have just let the Ancient...

_"No, he's not crazy,"_ Sage suddenly spoke up in the expectant silence. _"I can see it, Ryo. I know...You're not wrong." _

_"What are you babbling about, Halo?"_ Cale asked irritably, wondering if Sage had already lost his mind.

_"Halo..."_ Sage all but whispered thoughtfully. _"Yes, we have to keep hope alive. But not for ourselves." _

_"Sage?"_ Rowen asked softly, fearing for his friend's sanity.

_"It's okay, Rowen,"_ Sage assured his friend tenderly, kindly. To the others he said, _"Ryo is right. We are the hope of the world. Not because we still live or we still hope. Even if each and every one of us gave up and died right now, the hope and the fight will go on. No matter what happens to us." _

_"How?"_ Kayura asked, caught up in Sage's earnest.

_"Look into yourselves. We aren't just people anymore. We ceased being just people the day we battled and beat Talpa for the first time. From that day on, we were truly the Ronins and nothing more. Even without the armors we were warriors. The armors chose us because of that." _

_"What are you getting at, Sage?"_ Ryo asked, feeling his fire kindled once more.

_"We don't have to worry anymore,"_ Sage said coldly. _"We will die here in this place. But the fight will go on. Always before the warrior passed on his armor before the time of his death to ensure the continued battle." _

_"But, for us, that is not an option,"_ Sai said mournfully.

_"Maybe not,"_ Sage replied evenly. _"But even if we die still possessing the armors, they cannot_-will not-_fall into Khan's hands." _

_"But how..."_ Dais left the question unfinished as Sage projected an image into all of their minds simultaneously.

Before them stood nine children. Hardly more than infants, these children sat facing nine hollow armors. But the armors weren't hollow, not completely. They glowed and shimmered with the living essence of the nine warriors who had lived and died incased within them. And, as they watched, the children reached to an armor one by one.

_"What are you saying?"_ Kayura asked, awed by the vision.

_"We are not the first warriors, nor will we be the last,"_ Cale answered.

_"But this time the armors will take us with them,"_ Sekhmet added.

_"We know and the armors know that we have failed,"_ Rowen stated mournfully, though not despairingly.

_"But they also know as well as we that there are others out there that can continue the fight,"_ Ryo whispered.

_"Without our spirits to guide the next warriors, the fight is lost. Our hope alone will be carried thought the armors to lie hidden within the hearts and souls of the next bearers. There will come a day when the new warriors and their people will arise and rebel against the evil in this world, but it will be different,"_ Sage said this last with a weakening whisper.

_"Where we have battled in anonymity, they will truly be the hope of the world,"_ Dais spoke, awed by the understanding and hopefulness of Sage's words.

_"Yes,"_ all agreed in unison.

_"Find them,"_ Sage strained through his suffering to say. _"Look within yourselves, your armors and you will find them." _

_"Find them and remember,"_ Ryo took up, feeling the agony of his body returning once again. _"Where we failed, they will succeed, because others will know then. Find them. Find the others." _

In a sudden burst of agonizing release, Sage's hold gave way. Instantly all nine were torn from the inside out with soul rending pain once more. From nine separate points within the blackness of the room came nine weak cries of misery renewed. So consumed in pain were they that none noticed the one who had sat all the while smiling approvingly even as tears of pride streamed down his ancient and weary face.

**Part Four**

Screams. Blood. Agony. Suffering.

_"Nothing left,"_ he thought distantly. _"No more. There is nothing left. Let me die." _

"If only you could be so lucky, Halo," Kahn boomed with sadistic pleasure. "But there will be no death for you or the others. I'm enjoying this oh so much, I just might keep all of you alive for years. Or at least until I break you."

Laughing hysterically, whatever was left of Sage's mind tried to comprehend this eternity of suffering and couldn't. Nor could he understand why he couldn't simply give in and break or die or both. What did it matter anymore? Their world had ceased to exist to them so long ago.

So long ago...

How long had it been since he last felt his friends? Since he lasted walked the living forests? Since he had last known anything beyond this tortured existence?

He had only experienced twenty-three years of life. And all he had ever known were battles, fighting, and now suffering. No good. There had been no good in his life to compare to the darkness and the evil. And now there would never be good in his life. None of it mattered anymore. None of it. None of _them. _

_"Them?" _

Even as excruciating agony throbbed in the tattered remains of his legs, he could hear the screams of another slicing the darkness. Slicing the darkness, _becoming_ the darkness to dance with his own screams. Laughs? He couldn't tell anymore. It was all the same for him now.

_"Ryo,"_ Sage thought faintly with a proud smile at his own lingering ability to distinguish one's screams from another.

Those were Ryo's screams. Of all of them, he had been the one to suffer the most in the knowledge that he had failed to protect even these few he had once known as friends in another life far away from this place and this suffering.

_"Failed. We all failed,"_ Sage thought through the hysterical, shrieking laughter in his own mind. _"We failed!" _

With a suddenly curious expression mixed with amusement, Kahn moved once again to tower over Sage. For several seconds he only stood over what remained of what had once been the warrior Sage of the Halo Armor.

"Failed?" Kahn asked, now smiling maliciously. "Of course you failed. It took you all his time to realize that?"

Now booming his resounding laughter, it rang hideously throughout the room as Kahn spread his senses out to encompass all within the room.

"Yes, at last you are coming to accept your defeat," he laughed sadistically. "All this time and you are just know realizing it. Ha!"

Laughing roaringly, Kahn almost doubled over in his sadistic glee. Watching this, Sage felt the defeat in his friends as well. One by one each had accepted and understood both their failure and their defeat. And, from somewhere far away, came the desire to fight yet a while longer. Fight, if for no other reason than to hasten the end because they had not yet broken entirely. Nor would they. But he didn't know what to do, how to fight any longer. There was nothing left to fight with.

_"Was there?"_ he wondered distantly.

And then he knew what he had to do.

Just as suddenly as the cruel laughter had started, it ceased. Darkly Kahn regarded Sage upon the floor.

"You accept defeat, yet you do not break," Kahn stated contemplatively. "Why?"

"Ancient One, help us. Please," Sage croaked pitifully in the darkness.

"The Ancient has abandoned you. Just as surely as you have abandoned hope, Halo," Kahn told him almost angrily.

Gazing blindly into his enemy's face, Sage smiled both mockingly and serenely. Enraged by this, Kahn brought down his hand to crush Sage's twisted face into the floor. Blood spurting from between his fingers, Kahn himself smiled quite self-satisfactorily.

Just as quickly, Kahn's smile was twisted into a horrifying look of total shock as the translucent form of an ancient monk formed beside him. The ethereal clanging of his staff serving to further confuse and agitate Kahn's suddenly scrambled thoughts as he backed himself away. Watching in stark disbelief as the monk extended his hand to the still-living, yet mortally wounded Sage of the Halo. But even as ghostly form of Sage was pulled to a standing position, the equally translucent forms of the other eight also arose from their useless masses of flesh.

Turning to the Ancient, Sage felt as much as saw the old man's suffering and sorrow in this moment of completion; and also his love and warmth for these nine people who had lived, served, and died for him and his nine armors. Gazing upon Sage as he would his own son, the Ancient nodded as if to say, "It is time." In an unexpected display of emotion from both of them, they embraced warmly for a moment. Pulling apart, they could see the others gathering in a circle around them. Even as the circle formed, they could see Sage's form fading quickly.

"It has been an honor," Sage tearfully, happily told all of them as he faded rapidly with his body's quickening death. "Thank-you, my friends. Good-bye."

Lifting his staff, the Ancient allowed its power to seal Sage's very essence within the Armor of Halo before it disappeared leaving only the naked, twisted mass of flesh that had once been Sage's body. Realizing now what it was that was happening, Kahn pulled himself together and reached out. Gripping the bodies of the eight remaining Ronins and Warlords within deadly tendrils of his power, he faced the Ancient wickedly.

"They're as good as dead, monk. Back down now," Kahn demanded.

Pointing to Kahn with the tip of his staff, the Ancient condemned his foe and blessed his warriors in a single word.

"Never!"

"You preserved one, monk. But can you do eight at once?" Kahn sneered.

"This battle is over, Kahn," the Ancient stated, summoning his power. "Live or die, these warriors have lost in combat."

Chuckling, Kahn tightened his grip on the warriors' bodies. Ignoring both the Ancient and Kahn, the eight faced once another silently in a circle. From one to another each could see all in the eyes of their friends. Joining hands, they completed their circle around the Ancient. Raising his staff high above his head, the Ancient directed his attack at Kahn. In an instant Kahn both deflected the attack and killed the warriors in his grasp. As the eight around him began to fade almost instantly, the Ancient spoke only three words that told everyone present all they ever needed to know. A blessing, a curse, a gift, a promise, and a farewell, it was all he had left to say.

"So it ends," he stated, bare concealing a smile of his own.

"So it ends," Ryo echoed sorrowfully as darkness filled the whole of his vision.

And, as Kahn watched triumphantly, the nine spirits became no more. With them went the shattered remains of their armors. It was done and he now ruled supreme. Shouting his triumph gloriously, Kahn left the room and the rotting carcasses within it.

**Part Five**

Somewhere far away Ryo floated bitterly somewhere between light and darkness. It had come too soon. There had been no time and now all was truly lost. They had died too soon and there was nothing left.

Nothing...

_"At least I can sleep now,"_ Ryo thought wearily.

Closing his eyes for the last time in all the existence of his spirit, Ryo at last found the numbing peace of death. And so came the same eternal rest for the nine who had once been known as the last true warriors of our world.

Standing upon the serene shore of a distant ocean far from the death and destruction that had once been known as Earth, stood a man so old as to seem god-like. But he did not stand alone. All about him lay the bodies of eight men and a woman. All those he had come to cherish and love as if his own children in years gone by. But that was no more. _They_ were no more.

Clutching the lifeless form of the one who had been Sai of the Torrent to his chest, the Ancient wept silently. He wept not the bitter tears of defeat, but the cleansing tears of a mourner. Nothing more. Leaving his staff to protect the bodies of the other eight on the beach, the Ancient stepped forward. Hugging Sai's lifeless body one last time, he released it to the accepting waters and turned away. One by one, the Ancient returned each of the nine warriors to their final resting places. After stealing their lives as he had, he owed them that much.

"There are no victors in war. Nor are their heroes," the Ancient stated now to the world beneath him as he stood upon a forlorn cliff. "Only bodies and dreams remain. Rest well, my warriors. Your battle is over."

Letting fall the last of his tears, the Ancient turned from the desolate sight and disappeared into the forgotten dreams, shattered hopes, and crushed wills that consumed the new world under Kahn's unchallenged rule.

Elsewhere in the mortal world kneeled a red-haired twin of the Ancient. Before him sat a giggling child playing in the dirt of the filthy cave they had been forced to live in. Holding out a shiny red ball of seemingly indestructible glass, the Ancient's twin smiled warmly at the child's wide, innocent eyes.

"Such an odd monk you are to have survived all of this destruction and still continue to travel the way you do," commented the child's mother nearby. "You spread hope at every turn. This world needs more such as you."

Leaving the ball to the child, Anubis rose to his feet placing his hat once more upon his head. With a mysteriously knowing smile, he turned to leave.

"Yes, it does," he agreed softly. "Nine more such as myself."

And, as mysteriously as he had appeared, the monk who called himself Anubis began to walk away again. Behind him the excited squeals of the little child and his shiny red ball echoed through the cave warming his heart.

"Birtoo!" the child cried. "Birtoo! Bir-bir-birtoo!"

Smiling unseen, Anubis was gone.

"So it ends," his spirit whispered contentedly.

* * *


End file.
